Random Thoughts 3: Humanity’s Connection to the Sea

Today I was truly thinking about something random, and that was the strange bond that humans feel to the sea. We feel calmed by it, awed in its presence. We take notice of large bodies of water in general, but we’re strangely soothed by the sea, so long as its calm. For as easily as we can be pacified by the presence of a tranquil ocean, we are also terrified when it is angry, especially if we find ourselves at its mercy. Humans have an almost innate connection to the ocean. If ever you’ve needed to let go off stress you have to do little more than go and sit by the shore and breathe in and out as the waves crash over the sand.

I wonder why that is? Is it the sheer size of the ocean that does it? Do we feel humbled in the presence of something so much larger than ourselves? Do we understand our natural connection to it? Is there something ingrained into our DNA that calls back to the origins of life on Earth? Many people believe that the first cells to emerge on Earth occurred somewhere within a primordial soup. Some think that this view is wrong, and that the first lifeforms on Earth emerged somewhere in the depths of the ocean where vents gave rise to chemosynthetic forms of life. Regardless of which of these origin stories can account for the mysterious origins of life, it does seem as though it happened somewhere within the waters that cover the majority of our world’s surface, even if these waters were nothing like they are now back then.

The fossil record shows us that all life started in the sea, and the conquest of the land was a slow and arduous process. The ocean is, simply put, more conducive to life. Is this what we feel when we are near it? This origin, this great life-giving quality that enabled our very existence? Perhaps.

More recently in our evolution, the sea played a critical role for mankind. Around the time of the speciation that created modern man, it was crucial that people stay near the sea. The Earth was suffering through an ice age and most of the land had become desert in Africa. Farther from the equator, giant tracts of glacial ice covered the continents and trapped the majority of the fresh water. Early humans recognized the need to be by the coast, the increased occurrence of rain, the lifegiving bounty of sea life, these things gave mankind the ability to survive in a harsh world and perhaps gave us a form of genetic memory that makes the ocean a reassuring presence.

Indeed, the majority of people in the world live along coastlines. The most populated areas of any countries are more often near the ocean. Certainly, we can reason that this is largely for practical reasons; ease of travel and trade, abundance of food and resources, and even increased robustness of  nearby terrestrial life. These reasons do not negate the other factors I’ve presented, though, rather they may add to them to create a synergy of factors that draw us constantly towards shorelines.

While it is true that we can justify our draw to the sea with our heads, there is also an element that is intangible, an affinity of the heart. It is that same affinity which has led countless people to be roused by the presence of the sea. Countless artists, poets, singers, explorers, and innovators have drawn from the ocean as an unending well of inspiration. Time and time again it has captured our imagination and set in motion the wheels of human progress. There is undeniably something about the sea that enthralls the minds and hearts of men.

Regardless of what exactly it is that accounts for the effects of ocean, it still remains one of the most awesome forces in our world. An almost living, breathing entity that has made life as we know it possible on our world. Whether this be because of some inherent genetic resonance, or if it is simply because of the calming fall of water over rock and sand, or the beauty of a sun setting in the distance and scattering its light across the surface of the waters like a field of glittering gemstones, we know the sea is precious as it is powerful. Even the most competent sailors know to never trust it completely, but they may be the most in love with it of anyone. Beautiful, mysterious, powerful, and eternal. Mankind cannot resist the allure of the sea.